Teams

In the summer of 1996, exactly 30 years after the original UBC
baseball program was dismembered due to budget cuts, Athletic
Director Bob Phillip along with former professional Jim Murphy and
community baseball coach Mark Hiscott provided funding for the
present day Thunderbirds Baseball. Hiscott recognized student Terry
McKaig, a former collegiate player and national team member, as the
one to take over the program as head coach. Since ’97, McKaig has
been the driving force behind the T-Birds with support and funding
from such major leaguers as Jeff Zimmerman and Ryan Dempster.
Currently, the Thunderbirds compete in the United States as the
only Canadian member of the National
Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA). In 2001, the
program reached a new level as the New York Mets made Derran Watts the first
ever Thunderbird to be drafted, when they selected him in the 12th round. Since then nine more 'Birds
have been drafted including 2007 World Series starter Jeff Francis, who
recently inked a contract worth close to $50 million. While the
past has been extremely successful for T-bird baseball including
their trip to the 2006 NAIA World Series, the future at UBC is even
more exciting. In 2008 the NCAA accepted UBC’s bid to join as a
member for as early as the ‘09 season. While the paper-work is
still in progress, the sheer success of an extremely young 12 year
program has proved its ability to compete as Canadian athletes in
an American game.

Mens rugby is one of the oldest varsity sports at UBC (including
the precursor to UBC,McGill University College of BC, varsity rugby
started in 1906). The varsity XV now competes against the
University of Victoria in a two game, combined score series to
claim the coveted "Boot". They also play a two game, combined score
series against the University of California Berkeley (consistently
the best university rugby team in the US) for the "World Cup"
trophy (a competition started in 1921). The current varsity XV is
coached by Spence McTavish (former UBC varsity rugby captain,
former Canadian rugby international and captain, and former Bobby
Gaul award winner), and assistant coach Rod Holloway (former UBC
varsity rugby scrumhalf, and former assistant coach of Canada's
National Senior Men's team (RWC 1995)). UBC's rugby program has a
long tradition of producing national team rugby players (7's and
15's), most recently Jim Douglas (RWC 2003), Mike Burak (RWC 2007),
and Chris Pack. In the future, UBC's rugby program will have a
chance to compete for a spot in the inaugural 2008 Canadian
University Mens Rugby Championships in Markham, ON sponsored by
Rugby Canada.

The UBC Ultimate team, while comprised solely of UBC students,
is not technically recognized as a UBC Varsity team. Eligibility
and restrictions are not determined by the same governing body that
overlooks the other teams (except Debate).

National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics Championships
(3)

NCAA
membership bid

In 2005, they applied to become members of the principal U.S.
college sports governing body, the NCAA. They are
not the first Canadian school to try to join the NCAA; in 2000, local rival Simon
Fraser, then exclusively an NAIA member, sought to join the
NCAA but was turned down. At the time, the NCAA had language in its
constitution prohibiting non-U.S. schools from joining; however,
some observers believed the real reason Simon Fraser was turned
down was that the school sought to join as a Division II school, and the NCAA did not
want to set a precedent with a lower-level school. UBC, on the
other hand, was reportedly interested in joining Division I. UBC's current
athletic budget of approximately $4 million Canadian is
dwarfed by those of schools in the Pacific-10 Conference, the only
BCS conference
on the U.S. West Coast. However, at least two mid-major conferences with a West Coast
presence, the West Coast Conference and Western Athletic
Conference, had been suggested as possible future homes for the
Thunderbirds.[1]

In a more recent development, the NCAA approved a change to its
constitution on January 14, 2008 to allow Canadian schools to
become members. Under a 10-year pilot program due to begin June 1,
2008, Canadian schools can join the NCAA as Division II members,
and any school that meets the June 1 deadline for application can
become a member as of the academic year immediately following the
deadline. CIS has not officially indicated whether a school joining
the NCAA under this program can retain its CIS membership. It was
expected that both UBC and Simon Fraser would be among the first
schools to apply for NCAA membership under this program.[2][3]

History

In 1974, the members of the Thunderbirds hockey team travelled
to China to help share hockey
skills to with Chinese players.[4]